The Great Masai Mara

The great Rift Valley
My home for a couple of nights!
One of my favorite photos from the Masai Village
Part of the hut, it isn't much bigger than the picture shows.
During the welcome dance, he was the beat leader.
This lion was on the prowl soon after this photo, you can tell she was sniffing something.

At the Tanzania/Kenya border!

Rough beginnings can make the whole rough. I was worried this might happen to my weekend trip to Masai Mara (The best national game park in all of Africa). Thursday night it took a while for me to get ready for bed; I got in after 10 and had to finish packing my things. When I was all ready to hop into bed and catch some rest my roommates came in. One was washing the floor, another cooking dinner (yes after 11!). They were all LOUD. Talking to each other and singing songs. To make things worse my roommate left the light on which made me think she would be back in the room soon so I politely left it on for her but she didn’t come back in soon. Plus she left the door open which maximized the sound. After lying in bed trying to fall asleep I turned the light off and tried shutting the door, without actually getting out of bed. The noise was still too much and I could not take it so I got my iPod, turned it up loud which I hate doing, and eventually fell asleep. It had to be after midnight if not one o’clock by the time I was sleeping.

My alarm went off at 4:45…too early to wake up but I had to! The bus left at 5:30…but actually leaves early so I had to get down there quickly! Skipping over the boring stuff we (Monica, Alyssa A., Julia, and I) got the Nairobi campus, had breakfast and loaded an Aramati Safari van! I was excited we had a private driver and car for the whole weekend. We left shortly after 7:30 and drove through the Rift Valley and many Masai villages. The Rift valley is beautiful, even with the drought. I cannot even explain how far you can see! My favorite part was seeing the farms along the edge of a hill and the green acacia trees. We got to Flamingo Camp about 1:30 in the afternoon, were given our tents, and had lunch. Lunch was gross! I can officially say that I have tried sheep…mmmm?

At four o’clock we loaded in the van and went for our first Safari! I didn’t expect the game park to be so big but once we got in you could tell that there were so many different places you could go just inside! A main road goes into the Mara of each of 5 gates and quickly splits into many other roads so you go almost anywhere. The first animals we saw were cows…yes, cows, some of the Masai people, who cherish their animals as they are a huge source of food and income, live inside of the Mara. The first non-domestic animals we saw were wildebeests. These are pretty ugly creatures; they look so old with their beard. The first sighting was cool…but then we saw so many throughout the next couple of days that you realize they are pretty plain compared to the other animals you might see. Throughout our ride we came across Thomson gazelles, zebras, giraffes, elephants, impalas, illads, buffalo, vultures, lions, and a leopard! We were only out for a couple of hours but near the end it started to rain. The rain is good and everyone thanked God for it because of the drought and its need but I was so worried that we would get rained out the rest of the weekend and have a hard time seeing anything really interesting…and a hard time taking photos!

When we got back to camp we had tea and supper which was a huge step up from lunch! We stayed in the “Dinning Hall” until 10 because it was pouring and no one wanted to walk out in the rain. When Monica and I went back to our tent there was a Masai man sitting on our porch. They look a little bit scary and it was dark and he was sitting there with a flashlight. Since our tent didn’t have a light attached to the outside we figured he was just waiting for us to make sure we could find it. He began talking to us and showed us the lion’s claw necklace he had and we tried to quickly get inside, he didn’t speak very much English. He walked away but the rest of the night I could hear him outside. I was so scared because none of the other workers were Masai people and there are many who live around so I didn’t know if he was a guard or just a random guy. Eventually I found out he was a guard and felt a little better. The beds were something else…a really soft mattress on top of a planked frame with a lumpy pillow. I was tired though so I slept pretty well.

Breakfast was at seven the next morning and we headed out about eight. We did a day safari this time! To add on to the animals you already know that I saw, I also saw jackals, cheetahs, a secretary bird; teal crested Laura, waterbucks, a black headed heron, baboons, hippos, a crocodile, monkeys, birds, and a lizard. The safari wasn’t really as exciting as I had hoped until about lunch time. Right before we had our picnic lunch we stopped at the Tanzanian border! I can officially or unofficially say that I have been there! At our picnic we ate right next to a family of monkeys, some people were feeding them which isn’t good but it was so cute to see! Shortly after lunch was the best part of the day. We ran across two lions eventually you could tell that the lioness was hungry and in search of food. We watched it prowl a zebra but unfortunately lost it over a hill and didn’t see the outcome. It was so cool to watch though!

Someone asked me to remember the smells and sounds of the Safari to accompany the photos. I am going to do my best while it is fresh in my mind! The Mara itself smelt normal…like most of Africa, a bit dusty and naturey, I am not sure how else to describe it. There were areas that smelt of death, and some that smelt like, dare I say it, poop. I can recall the Zebra’s neighing in a sort of donkey/horse way and tried to capture it on video. The hippos made a really interesting noise that there is no way for me to describe something mixed with the water blowing of a whale. I don’t think I actually heard a lion roar or much of a noise from any of the other animals.

Right after the safari we went to the Masai village. This was probably my favorite part of the trip. The people came and did a welcome dance for us where they made these crazy bodily noises and jumped and hopped around. Near the end they pulled Alyssa in and made her participate in their jumping contest. They eventually hopped all around us and stuck us in the middle until we jumped with them. One of the men showed us around the village, the cattle shade/shed, where we walked on cow dung and saw children having something similar to a snowball fight…, a house, and how they make fire using friction. The houses are so small; there were twenty of them in the village that was centralized on the cattle shade. The first room in a house is for small cows and the second room is the kitchen, the bedrooms have half walls with the kitchen. The entire kitchen is is a short fire stove with about a foot and a half on either side and then you hit the walls of the parents’ bed and the children’s bed. Quite a simplistic home, there was a small, less than a square foot window, and fairly low ceilings. At the end of the village tour they brought us to their market where each of the twenty families had a stand and were trying to sell us everything! This is something I think everyone should experience one day, they are like persistent beggars except they have something to offer in return. The funniest thing was a man offered for me to choose something in exchange for my watch, he said, “masai like watches.” I told him that I did too.

After the village tour the man showed us the school that had been built. There are still many Masai children who don’t go to school but this is a great starting point for them. They are all taught English, mathematics, Christianity, and a few other things. The rooms aren’t very big and have a lot of students in a class, but it is a start anyways.

We headed back to camp where we had some relaxation time before dinner. Dinner was very good again and I tried French onion soup…and liked it… During dinner Sylvia, who came with us, asked us if it would be okay if we skipped the morning safari because her dad had gone into the hospital and she wanted to leave early to go see him. We all agreed that it would be the right thing to do to skip it, but none of us really wanted to. After eating we played cards with two Japanese guys who were both traveling on their own around the world and happened to be in the same safari group. We taught them how to play a Kemps and spoons, they were hilarious! Then to bed!

I woke up at 5:45 and got ready. We had to have all of our things ready and be to breakfast by 6:15. At breakfast we heard good news! Sylvia decided that since we were eating breakfast early we could still go on the morning ride and get out earlier than the other plans allowed. The other plans included having early morning tea, going for the ride, and coming back for breakfast at 9. We were all very excited and we headed out camp before 7.

I am so happy we got to go because we saw one of the highlights of my trip this morning! First we saw a few dead wildebeests and knew that something had been on the prowl overnight. Next we saw two lions feasting on a cow! I wish we could have seen the attack but this was cool enough. One lion was just finishing when we arrived and he dragged the rest of the cow to his brother who chewed on it for a while. Once the cow had been moved a group of vultures swarmed to the area and began eating the flesh that was left behind. During the process a jackal came in and stole some of the flesh the vultures were eating, it was quite a sight! The rest of the morning was fairly similar to the other days.

We went through a different gate to exit and were bombarded with Masai women trying to sell us jewelry through the window of the van. We used the bathrooms here and I got my first experience with a hole in the ground…well these were actually like a toilet bowl in the ground. It was quite interesting… On the way back we stopped at the rift valley viewpoint and used their bathrooms which were really a hole in the ground. I think everyone needs to try these someday as well…it’s like going outside but actually having to have it go in a certain place! Thank goodness I only had to pee!

Anyways the weekend was good, very good. I enjoyed the safari but cannot see how a person would take their entire vacation just to do that, I don’t recommend it at the price! If you are ever in the area, or are taking a trip in Africa it would be an added bonus! Or if your heart is set on doing a safari make sure to couple it with other traditional African things. It was amazing, but not as amazing as I expected.